These researchers find from data in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth that children raised in mother-father households have a significantly smaller change of being incarcerated in the future than do children raised in other family structures. Relative to children in father-absent families children from mother-father families still have significantly lower chances of being incarcerated after controlling for the timing of the father’s departure.

Father absence and youth incarceration. Journal of Research on Adolescence 14 (3): 369-98.